Lloyd, Stanley

About

Stanley Lloyd is probably best known for his illustrations for Enid Blyton’s Malory Towers series, for which he did all the first edition illustrations. He was, though, very active in the field of pony book illustration, and the majority of his book illustration was for books featured horses.

Stanley Lloyd started his career doing magazine illustration for The Detective Magazine, and later for Woman’s Magazine. He went on to illustrate many pony books, as well as doing that rite of passage for the equine illustrator, Black Beauty, but his most iconic pony illustrations are those he did for Primrose Cumming’s Silver Snaffles. Knight, when they republished the book as a paperback, cut the illustrations entirely, but they are one of the things that made the book so magical for so many readers. When Fidra Books reissued Silver Snaffles, all the original illustrations were included. They are possibly his best, capturing the feeling between the children and the ponies, though his donkey in Ethel Nokes’ That Ass Neddy does have a rare charm too.

Lloyd’s illustrations don’t meet with universal approval. He did have a weakness for portraying ponies with very wide foreheads, and occasionally rather bulging eyes (see in particular A-Riding We Will Go, and The Chestnut Filly, though there are other titles I could just as easily have quoted.) This either seems to form part of his charm, or to infuriate.

Stanley Lloyd was a member of a family thoroughly involved in the horse world. He illustrated several of his nephew, John Ivester Lloyd’s books. His brother, John Ivester Lloyd’s father, was the well known artist Tom Ivester Lloyd.

Stanley Lloyd wrote at least two books himself: Jam Sauce: A Humorous Novel, which is according to the author of Heather’s Blyton Pages: “a story about three young men a beautiful girl, missing jewels, crazy crooks and a maharajah!”, and Thick Treacle.

Thank you to Carol Hewson for giving me permission to use these images.

Finding the books

The books he illustrated are generally easy to find. Good editions with dustjackets of Silver Snaffles can be expensive, and this will also apply to the Enid Blyton firsts.

Links and sources
Carol Hewson: Stanley Lloyd’s great niece
Heather’s Blyton Pages